Sunday, February 28, 2010

In September 2001, a young eL Stinkeyes applied for his Egyptian Visa. I saved up all my monies, planning on checking out the pyramids and temples, go swimming in the Red Sea, you know the whole "Egypt thing." A couple of days later I wake up to a phone call. It's my mother. She sounds really upset and she asking me if I'm okay. "Of course." I say half asleep. "What do you mean?" "You don't know? Terrorist flew a plane into the World Trade Center and it's on fire." This is just too surreal and I'm still half asleep and I finally convince my mother that there are no terrorist at my front door and hop on my bike to ride down the street to my friends house who has a TV. I didn't have one at the time. This is not a "where were you the day..?" story so I'll fast forward through the carnage and brimstone and get to the part where I got back home later and checked my mail and aside from the normal mail, I received my Egyptian visa. The following week my mother called me daily, begging me not to the Middle East. Me being young and carefree thought nothing of it but through numerous guilt laden trips I finally agreed to not go to Egypt. All for my mother. So my obvious plan B was to go to Peru and see Machu Pichu. Eventually I wound at a seaside town called Trujillo where I got the most awful food poisoning ever. The worst pain ever felt in my entire life. Having said that, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Trujillo's surf rock gods, Los Belkings.

Friday, February 26, 2010

In honor of SXSW steadily approaching, I am posting this because A.) Its a great album with a great back story. B.) There is a great book about the subject being promoted right now and C.) I will be participating this year by performing pieces from this record with the author and many special guests.

To begin with, in 1962 Johnny Cash began dipping his feet in the civil rights pool emerging at the time, more specifically the American Indian Movement. Upon completion of this record in 1964, Columbia records decided not to release it due to its political content and this when Cash was riding the wave of success off of "Ring of Fire." Today the album is available on digital format but the demand from Cash fans for its "proper release" grows daily. I would suggest to go here for a well scripted historical account.

The book, "A Heartbeat and A Guitar" by Antonino D'Ambrosio, is critically acclaimed and a must read for both Cash fans and civil rights advocates. We will be performing works from "Bitter Tears" while the author reads passages from his book. My good friend and music boss, Martin Perna will be in the house along with Wayne Kramer of legendary proto-punk institution MC5 plus some "surprise guests" and giving the fact that guests in the past have been Chuck D, Billy Bragg, and Tom Morello, there's no telling who's going to show up. Dates are below.

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Oh internets, how do I love thee. You bring the whole world together while I just sit on my ass and stare at a monitor. This compilation you see before you was sent to me from the source, my new Peruvian friend Wilmer. To summarize part of the text document in the file as well, "Chicha is more than a musical movement. It is a social movement of the mestizos." This is music of the people. I will no longer consider Lima the capital of Peru. Viva Cusco!

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Bo Diddley, "The Originator" as many called him, is responsible for assisting in the fusion on blues and rock n' roll. His self-invented legacy manifested itself into a reality where he changed music culture forever. Ed Sullivan cursed Bo calling him "one of the first colored boys to ever double-cross him" and stating he "wouldn't last six months"......stupid gringo. One of the only guitar players to a have a drum beat named after him. A man that named many of his works after himself. This being the case, you can say he influenced hip hop as well with his self-revelry. Plus you cant deny that he's rapping on "Who Do You Love", no matter how primitive it may sound by today's lyrical standards. He released over thirty albums and in short, he's "The Shit."

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Oh the road of crate digging, analog or digital, it can be rough most of the time and the rewards are few. Listening to hours of middle of the road music just to find that one gem. Culling through the dregs of music history. Its kinda like cleaning up somebody's house after they passed away and going through a bunch of bullshit. 90% of everything winds up in the garbage while you go home with a lamp or something. Well guess what? Who passed away? Psyche rock (R.I.P.) and here is the lamp I'm bringing home to you that's gonna shed some light on the Latin American psyche scene in the 60's.

Now I must admit I'm more of a fan of the gear than the music of the 60's. I like the sound of the recordings more so the sound of the music itself. No, I dont want to hear "Satisfaction" or "Day Tripper" covered in Spanish. No, I dont care if your wearing Syd Barrett's dirty underwear dipped in LSD. Just be a young Latino and give me a hook goddamnit!

Monday, February 8, 2010

Back in the late nineties I stumbled upon a CD entitled Ethiopiques. After listening to it I realized that I wasn't as funky as I, a young twenty-something chicano kid, thought I was. I knew James Brown. Who doesnt? I was just getting into Fela Kuti, who you should know. But, this was Eastern African. Arabian style modes and scales. Polyrhythms in 4 and 6 stacking on each other. Menacing riffs. Like The JB's armed with a bunch of those squiggly knives. At the heart of this new found world of Ethiopian music was my man, Mulatu Astatke. The father of "Ethio jazz". This guy is to popular Ethiopian music like what Duke Ellington is to jazz. There's just no way around him and America is finally catching on.

This compilation covers his early years when he studied in London and New York (he was also the first African to attend Harvard) and his triumphant return back to Ethiopia. All killer. No filler.

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Talk about nostalgia. 1991, I was a freshman in high school. Some wayward skater kid who liked playing guitar and The Misfits. Learning how to smoke shitty cigarettes my friend would steal from his old man. Then I met this dude, lets call him......Clarence. Clarence was one of the cool kids who played drums in a local punk band. One of those kids who had a badass leather jacket, doc martins, odd hair, piercings and happened to live in my neighborhood. We could go over to Clarences house and smoke weed and cigarettes and what not in peace because his parents were "cool." One day Clarence puts this record on and, I still remember this moment, this beast of a bass guitar sound just slaps my face. Clarence is air-guitaring and drumming away, banging his head around. I'm there probably making a ugly face melting face and grinding my teeth in rock-inspired awe. The first song ends. I ask "Who is this?" He says nothing and throws the record cover at me while the second song starts.

This is definitely one of those records that made me want to seriously play music. Even to this day this album is amazing. Many consider this to be nomeansno's best. I am one of them.

About Me

The purpose of the blog is to promote the artists. The majority of these postings will be rare out-of-print material. If you like what you hear and the artists are still producing please support them by going to their performances and showering them with monies.